The subject matter disclosed herein relates to gas analysis and more specifically relates to an improvement in gas sampling and measurement/analysis.
Gas analysis sensors oftentimes utilize gas absorption of light to detect the presence and/or concentration of particular gases. For example, non-dispersive infrared (“NDIR”) sensors measure the concentration of a particular gas in a sample by determining an absorption amount of particular wavelengths of light associated with a relatively-high level absorption band of the particular gas being measured.
As gas detection/analysis becomes more useful and NDIR sensors become less expensive and more popular, an increasingly vast number of applications for these sensors may be envisioned. For flexibility and/or cost savings, it may be desirable to reduce the size of the NDIR sensors. However, NDIR sensor accuracy may be directly impacted by the gas sample size that resides between an infrared source and an infrared detector. Unfortunately, traditional NDIR sensor designs have had to balance between sensor size reduction and sensor accuracy because reducing the size of NDIR sensors has traditionally resulted in a greatly reduced gas sample size, thus potentially reducing accuracy of the NDIR sensors.
Accordingly, it would be beneficial to provide an enhanced sensor design that provides for increased gas sampling while reaping the benefits of a reduced form factor. This and further objects and advantages will be apparent in the detailed description of embodiments discussed below.